England

Anderson, greatness and England's lost generation

Barring injury and other disasters, James Anderson will, at some point next month, become the 26th bowler in the history of Test match cricket to take 300 wickets. He will be only the fourth Englishman to pass the mark, which, considering that Fred Trueman was the first to do so in 1964, puts him in elite company as far as the three lions go.

Trueman's landmark will be fifty years old come next summer. When he walked off the field at the Oval having taken the defining wicket of Neil Hawke, Fred was asked if he thought anyone would beat his record. "I don't know," he replied, "but they'll be bloody knackered if they do." To Trueman in 1964, the thought of 400 Test wickets was a distant Everest. The notion of a man taking 800 might have been enough to leave even Fred temporarily wordless, and he didn't quite live to see it done.

Ian Botham retired with the English record of 383 wickets in 1992 but 11 bowlers have gone on past 400: three from India, two from West Indies, two from Australia, and one each from Sri Lanka, New Zealand, South Africa and Pakistan. Or, put another way, at least one player from each of the other seven major Test nations has achieved something that no English bowler has.

With his almost undetectable variations of grip and wrist position, his rudder of a thumb, his angle on the crease, his endurance and his pace, Anderson can be irresistible, symphonic in his variations on a narrow theme. He knows about as much as any man can about the fragile mysteries of swing, because he can on occasion be defenceless without it. Perhaps more than any other bowler in the elite echelon that he is about to join, Anderson is hostage to forces beyond his control.

When he surmounts that 300 barrier (he currently has 298), it will be with an average of above 30 runs per wicket. It's odd but unavoidable that such a blunt stat will temper judgement of the feat and of Anderson's standing, but he will be one of just three of the 26 bowlers in the club with an average of above thirty. Of the others, Harbhajan Singh and Brett Lee enjoyed long periods with their cumulative average below 30, and only Daniel Vettori has never dipped under the mark. Anderson was last there in August 2003, after his sixth Test match.

"During the ragged decade of the 1990s and beyond, England stalled while records piled up"

Andy Zaltzman once dug out a gem of a stat: that Viv Richards needed to make at least 20 in his final Test innings to end his career with an average of more than fifty. Twenty runs, after the levels of Richards' accomplishments, were nothing, but in a way they were everything too. It wouldn't seem right that the avatar of modern batsmanship was forever denied the statistical company of, for example, Shivnarine Chanderpaul.

So it is with bowlers. Thirty seems to be the mark at which ambiguity begins, where good and great slowly begin to separate from one another, where a decision has to be made as to who belongs where.

Anderson's career has had a different sweep to many. His first 100 wickets cost him 35. By the time he reached 200, the figure was under 32. Now it is a hair above 30. It is a gentle curve, reflective of a craft being slowly but progressively refined.

At his current strike rate of a wicket every 59 deliveries, he will need to bowl another 800 overs to go past Botham, in another thousand he could become the first Englishman to 400. At his rate of around 36 overs per Test, that's another 30 games, or three years of full fitness and endeavour.

At around the same time, Alastair Cook or Kevin Pietersen might be the first English Test batsman to pass 10,000 runs, a total already exceeded by three men from India, three from Australia, two from West Indies, two from Sri Lanka and one from South Africa.

During the ragged decade of the 1990s and beyond, England stalled while these records piled up. It's only now, as the same achievements come into view for a generation of players to have benefited from central contracts, consistency of selection, rigour in coaching and financial investment that their scale is apparent.

The record books say that the world left England a long way behind. The story of a generation is told through its absence from them.

The reason Fred Trueman was so bloody knackered was because not only was Hawke his 300th Test wicket, he was his 1,888th First Class wicket. When Botham dismissed Jeff Dujon for his 300th Test wicket it was his 828th First Class wicket. Anderson has 550 First Class wickets.

This gradual reduction in First Class games mean that England finally are preserving their best players for Tests. If there had been a similar policy in the 1990s then their best players, like Atherton or Gough, would already be members of the 10,000 club or the 400 club.

Posted by &nbsp
on (April 6, 2013, 1:34 GMT)

well...this was the best article i've read on cricinfo yet.

Posted by Protears
on (April 5, 2013, 15:19 GMT)

James Anderson has alway had talent, perhaps not always the belief he could be a top class bowler. At this moment in history he is among the best seamers in International cricket where unfortunately there are few whom can stand out head and shoulders above the rest.

Posted by &nbsp
on (April 5, 2013, 13:16 GMT)

Would love nothing more than seeing Anderson go beyond 300 wickets during England's next series. What can be a better stage than the Ashes to achieve that! Hope its a rejuvenated Anderson that appears then.

Posted by Mitcher
on (April 5, 2013, 1:43 GMT)

Anderson is a lovely swing bowler who is fantastic to watch - and barely playable - on his day. There's no way I can see him being considered great in the long term but does it really matter.

Posted by vsssarma
on (April 4, 2013, 14:55 GMT)

There is a resurgence in the ENG cricket since 2009, due to the preformances of Swann, Cook, Broad, Anderson, Prior, Pietersen, Trott, Strauss & Bell.

Amongst the current bowlers, I rate Swann at 744, Finn at 638 and Anderson at 602. Swann is as good as Jim Laker and we can expect great results from him.

Posted by sidrrrs
on (April 3, 2013, 14:09 GMT)

I wouldn't worry about the 30 average too much - Jimmy averaged 39 for his first 20 tests and 28 since then.

Posted by wrenx
on (April 3, 2013, 12:39 GMT)

For all the debate about batting averages lacking relevance when describing a batsman's value, bowling averages are even more meaningless. More so than batting, they are subject to fluctuations to correct them to the 30-run mark, particularly when you look at bowlers claiming tail-end wickets. It's better to judge Anderson more qualitatively, or else, for the top- and middle-order wickets he has claimed

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jon HottenJon Hotten is the author of Muscle and The Years Of The Locust, neither of which is about cricket, and writes the blog The Old Batsman, which is. @theoldbatsman